Adventures in Teaching and Learning

This post will hopefully cover straightforward video sites as well as more interactive audiovisual sites. Once again, I have asked my PLN (Personal Learning Network) of other “educationalists” and “edtech” folk at Twitter to share their favourite sites, which I will hopefully share with you here. I’ll start with a few of my own:

YouTube – Probably one of the most well known Web 2.0 sites. There is a lot of inappropriate content, as there is anywhere, but don’t be put off – there is a vast amount of fantastic content as well. If you are an RE teacher, then from my skattp profile, you can find links to a group for RE teachers and to some other accounts that I find helpful. I am sure there are similar groups for other subjects.

TrueTube – There some excellent (British based) videos on here that would make great debate starters. TrueTube hopes that young people will make more equally provoking videos and share them on the site. I have written about TrueTube before, here.

Teachers’ TV – An excellent resource for CPD; the site also contains videos that can be used in class. There are also groups and forums that you can take part in.

TeacherTube – Videos by and for teachers.

Animoto – Upload photos, choose from a selection of Creative Commons music, and Animoto will produce an audiovisual presentation for you.

Xtranormal – If you can type, you can make movies. An easy way for a teacher to make a starter video, or for a student to produce an ICT-based piece of homework.

VoiceThread – You could add this as a way to introduce a topic, by uploading a picture or video, then recording a commentary while using pens to highlight key points. Or, you could upload students’ work, and other students can then comment on each others’ work, as a form of peer assessment.

GoAnimate – A fairly easy way to produce short animations. These can then be hosted on a video site, such as YouTube or TeacherTube.

Voki – This is an easy way for you, or a student, to animate a message without having to record your face as well as your voice. You normally need a blog to host it on.

Audacity – An excellent tool that can be downloaded for free. Easy to use to record and to transform voices as well. The voice can then be added to vokis or other videos.

There are some good primary examples on this Demo Primary School site, based in Falkirk. Thanks to @mvass for producing it, and to @johnmclear for drawing it to my attention!

I will add more later, as I receive more suggestions!

It’s always nice to share ideas and get ideas from others. I came across Box of Tricks when I began using Wordle; today I thought I would revisit and discovered that the blogger has been using Voki in his classroom, with Year 9 boys. Having listened to some of them on his school blog, I have been very impressed (and reminded of my years living in Nottingham!) Then I discovered Senor Picardo’s Animoto challenge – and an entry produced by a student. These are certainly very good ways of using ICT in the classroom, and I have found them quite inspiring. I hope you do too!

It’s Activities Week. (Not sure about the use or not of an apostrophe there … I’ve been wondering about it all week. Feel free to let me know!) My “activity” is using ICT in the classroom, in particular using Voki and Animoto. We also wanted to use CrazyTalk.

I’m sure you know what’s coming next. Despite arranging before the weekend for these sites to be unblocked, and despite the best efforts of our ICT network manager to unblock them today, for the best part of the day no one could access either of these sites. Of course, the pupils are all able to access games which involve shooting or racing. We eventually managed to get a couple of pupils onto voki, and a handful onto animoto, but even then, in all but one case, animoto seemed to crash before they had their final video. At least the one pupil who managed to produce a video seemed pleased with the result!

Right. I’m off to upload the photos a couple of pupils took round the school and see if I can make a nice animoto from home instead, to wow them all with tomorrow!

Get a Voki now!

The new TTP group meet on Tuesday; I have the privilege of hosting a session on Web 2.0, involving pedagogy and practical application. So today I have been trying to think of uses for a variety of Web 2.0 applications, hence the large number of posts! I think it’s about time to pull some of those ideas together.

Voki
I enjoy adding vokis onto my blogs to liven them up a bit and add sound. It’s a humorous way of engaging the students as well, and for students who find reading a bit more difficult, then Voki instructions may be a bit easier to follow. If students have access to computers, then I think Vokis work well especially in MFL, where students can record short paragraphs in the target language: this could then be used for peer and self assessment purposes. The main difficulty I have with Voki is that they are not downloadable, so they can only be shown when hosted on a browser somewhere and cannot be inserted into powerpoint presentations. (If they can, and I’m missing something, please let me know!) Of course, CrazyTalk can be used to similar effect, but with a little more effort.

If you have used Voki successfully as a teaching and learning tool, please drop me a line to let me know!

VoiceThread
This seems like a good way to encourage students to listen to one another and to respond to one another. A VoiceThread can be used to gather a variety of opinions and ideas, which can be shared or kept private (In this case, you would need to make accounts for all students, and add them all as your friends on the VoiceThread that you wanted them to watch/listen/comment on. They can also be moderated.) I have seen some good examples, eg “This picture makes me think …”, Students reading out poems that they have written in response to a visual stimulus, students using the doodle tool to demonstrate what they think will happen next in an experiment (actually, I haven’t seen that, but I think it could be a good idea … if you moderate the comments, then keep them all hidden until you have received everyone’s comments) … I’m sure there are many more.

What ideas do you have for how you could use VoiceThread in your subject? If you have already used it, could you add a link in the comments box so we can see it and be inspired?

Slideshare
An easy way to share presentations. I have made a very basic one with the most basic key points for my GCSE students to support their last minute revision, and another one with pictures to illustrate Pentecost, which I will use in my lessons next week. The other side, of course, is that there are many interesting presentations out there, that can either inform us as educators, or can be used by us in the classroom.

Have you a favourite presentation that you found on SlideShare? Or have you uploaded a presentation made by your students that could inspire us?

YouTube, TeacherTube, GodTube, TED, GoogleVideo, Teachers’ TV
I am sure there are other video sharing websites out there, these are just some of the most common, or ones that I have found recently. Videos can be a great starter for lessons, and there are some great educational clips out there, as well as lots of funny clips that can begin discussion. Just be careful though – I showed a clip of Mel Brookes as Moses, dropping one of the tablets on which were written the Fifteen – well, now Ten – Commandments in order to start thinking about the Decalogue with my class, and quite a few of them assumed that there really were originally fifteen … ! I have also used the Honda Cogs clip to illustrate the concept of causation. Of course, the next stage is then making your own videos to upload and share with others. For a trial, I made a video using OneTrueMedia, and uploaded that to YouTube. It’s not great, but at least it shows it can be done! I am also a member of the RE Group on YouTube.

How have you used YouTube or another video site during a lesson? Why do you think showing short video clips can be such a good learning tool?

Well, there are hundreds of other sites, and it’s getting late and I have other things to do, so that will have to do for now. I do hope that some of you who read this will leave a comment suggesting ways in which these, and other Web 2.0 applications, can be used effectively in the classroom to enhance teaching and learning.

Today I am sharing with you my podbean account. I have recorded a few episodes that my GCSE auditory learners can download and listen to, rather than reading the Revision Guide. I’ve linked the podbean site to my GCSE blog, so the episodes do not use up lots of room on my blog.

It will be interesting to see how many of my students decide to take advantage of these audible revision aids. I might include one as a voki on my site to encourage them to see what’s available as well … If anyone else is teaching Edexcel Catholic Christianity, feel free to use them too.

NOTE: I’ve since discovered Amy’s GeographyRocks podbean account, which has some great student interviews about migration! An excellent example of how podcasting can be used with students to share ideas.

I’ve been surfing around, discovering some interesting blogs. For example, I found the International Edubloggers’ Directory via Joe Dale’s blog. Through this, I’ve been browsing Mrs Cooch’s school blog, which has some good use of CrazyTalk. Joe also features a VoiceThread entitled “What does the network mean to you?“, which I look forward to listening to more fully when I get my headphones out!

What a wonderful example of using Vokis to support pupil voice – Nodehill’s French Department blog, Two Stars and a Wish. In turn, Mrs Bushell’s blog directed me towards some RE games.

How exciting the internet is!

I’m now Twittering too!

Just in case anyone is wondering what the sudden flurry of blog activity is all about … I have been asked to give a presentation on Web 2.0 and blogging to a conference on Friday, so I’m busy trying to make sure I’ve tried out as many different widgets as possible, so I can share some good ideas with the participants. I’m also trying to make sure there are lots of links that will help any new visitors to my blog that would like to follow the digital breadcrumbs to find out more about Web 2.0 and blogging. It would be nice to hear from any readers to find out if they have tried any of the things I’ve been trying, either by yourself or with pupils. I’m going to try and make a Voki for my class blogs now!

Get a Voki now!

But can you see her?

Try viewing her on my other website … again, if anyone can suggest how I can make her visible on this WordPress blog, please let me know! I have chosen WordPress as the destination, I’ve copied and pasted the embedding code straight into the blog post, and also into the SWF button.

Get a Voki now!